MJ
by SomePretentiousDumbName
Summary: In which Michelle Jones does not employ a cruel and wicked tactic to uncover Peter Parker's most coveted secret and instead it's just a regular love story because someone forgot to follow the story treatment while writing this. :)))
1. Chapter 1

Michelle is observant.

Everybody knew that. While her nose remained deep in the pages of her latest read—An Introduction to First Year Psychology textbook, from the college library down the road—her ears were set on high alert, and her eyes were peering over the top of the book, roving the halls like a security droid. The halls themselves were packed with students, the clock hand striking noon signaling lunch. In a few short moments the congested hallways of students quickly dispersed, most of them heading for the cafeteria.

Most of them. Most of them, except Peter Parker. While everyone else headed in one direction to the cafeteria, Peter Parker was walking in the opposite direction. Michelle watched him closely; he was headed for the Computer Science Lab. But before he opened the door and took a step inside, he checked over his shoulder to make sure no one was watching. He didn't see her, of course, because no one ever did, and that was her advantage.

Thinking himself alone, Parker quickly flung open the door to the lab and wandered in, closing the door quietly behind him. These were obvious symptoms of a guilty man. Guilty of _what_ was the question.

Michelle was on her feet before the door clicked shut. Her textbook had been left behind in favor of her new study: Peter Parker. The sixteen year-old basket case was a mystery wrapped in an enigma, dropping decathlon then picking it back up almost the next day, before disappearing in Washington and reappearing moments after a rare disaster, then disappearing from Homecoming the night that Liz's father was apprehended by Spider-Man. If one was smart enough, all of these clues pointed to a very obvious conclusion.

But none of that was admissible evidence; Michelle was looking for was conclusive, solid proof that Peter Parker is Spider-Man.

"Sup, nerds," she said after kicking open the door to the Computer Science Lab, nearly shattering the wooden frame. Peter literally jumped out of his seat while Ned threw his hands into the air and shrieked, "It's just porn, I swear!"

"Ned!" Peter groaned, shooting his best friend a chastising look. Ned, hands still in the air, could only shrug.

"What're ya boys doing in here?" Michelle asked casually, sauntering into the room with the confidence of someone who had just almost broken a fucking door. Peter and Ned were on the other side of the room, and while she approached, Ned hurriedly closed every tab on the monitor before shoving some tossed papers into his bag.

"Us? We're just, you know, just playing some computer games and stuff," Peter said, scratching his nose nervously. He made sure Ned has stuffed all the important stuff away before shooting Michelle a disarming smile.

"Oh yeah?" She pressed.

"Yup."

Michelle nodded, unconvinced. "So you two don't mind if I catch up on some reading in here?"

Peter glanced at Ned, who was still cleaning up all the mysterious evidence.

"It gets pretty noisy," Peter said, getting more comfortable in the lie. "You know we were going to use the, uh, the speakers, the surround sound, because it sounds cool."

"Crisper audio," Ned added.

"Yes! Much crisper audio," Peter affirmed excitedly, patting Ned on the back for the ingenious cover up.

Michelle could hear his foot tapping from across the room.

"That's fine," she said.

Peter cleared his throat. "What?"

"That's fine," she repeated, taking a few more steps into the room, closing the gap between them. Ned had cleaned up the table they were sitting at, stopping just short of wiping their fingerprints down. Peter, meanwhile, was choking on some words in his throat.

"Look, Michelle—"

"MJ. My friends call me MJ."

"Right, MJ. Look..."

He hadn't thought very far ahead. By this time Michelle was standing across from them at the table. She pulled up a stool and sat down, leaning across the table as far as she could. Despite the now accentuated height advantage Peter held over her, he still felt small and distressed under the girl's icy glare. Michelle reminisced on the thought of those old detective movies, where the detective would interogate the culprit in a dark, smoky room with nothing but two chairs and a table.

Of course, the detective always won in those movies.

"Nice turtleneck," she said pleasantly.

"What? Yeah. Thank you."

"Did May get it for you?"

"No actually I bought it from this store on Fifth Street just across from the—wait, how do you know my Aunt's name?"

"I went and saw her this morning after you left. I told her you forgot a textbook and that I was getting it for you. She's nice."

Ned's jaw was on the table, and it looked to be more from awe than shock. Peter, on the other hand, didn't seem to know how to process this information.

"I—I—I—"

"Also I snooped around in your room for a bit."

If Ned had been drinking something he would've spit it out dramatically. "What!"

"What!" Peter echoed, missing the full sync by a brief second.

If she was capable of it, Michelle would be smirking. "Do you want to know what I found, Parker?"

Peter was visibly sweating now. The bitter October weather had forced him into wearing layers which, coupled with the 68°F climate that the school was kept at, had him soaking through his new turtleneck. Michelle's cold glare did little to cool him down, ironically.

"Look, MJ, I know what it—"

"Nothing," she said. "I found nothing. But now..." She squinted suspiciously at the both of them. "Now I think I missed something. What _are_ you hiding, Parker?"

The sixteen year-old stood motionless, face unwavering as his brain processed every possible lie he could use in that moment. Thankfully his best friend came to the rescue in the nick of time.

"Peter's gay."

 _Rescue_ in a broad sense.

"Ned!"

"He's hiding a Men's Warehouse Catalog under his bed."

"Not true!"

"You must've missed it but, yeah, that's it. Case closed, right?"

"Not right! The case is not closed!"

"So there _is_ a case?" Michelle interrupted.

Peter's eyes were as wide as they could be when he gaped at her. His hands were scrunched up in his short hair, threatening to rip it all out.

"No...?" Ned answered awkwardly, unsure of what the right answer was. "Unless it's already been closed, in which case yes there is a case, but it's closed, so you can just, you know, forget it."

"What? No! There's no case, there's no secret, I'm not gay, I'm not hiding anything, we're just...we're just..."

"Playing computer games," Michelle finished for him.

"Playing computer games," Peter confirmed meekly. He let out a shaky breath that he had been holding in for some time.

This is exactly where Michelle wanted him: shaken, disturbed, nervous, completely off his guard and unprepared, essentially the perfect conditions for secret-spilling.

"What kind of computer games?" Michelle asked, unraveling their story at the seams.

"DOOM." Ned quickly offered.

"Show me," Michelle replied just as quickly.

Ned had no response to that. He looked at her, then his laptop, then her, then Peter, then his laptop, then her again. "Show you?"

"Yeah. Is there a problem? I mean, if you were just playing DOOM, you should still have it open, right? Or at least you should have it downloaded. So, show me."

It was Ned's turn to sweat now. "You want me to show you DOOM?"

"Yeah. Yeah that's what I just said."

Ned froze, which made it Peter's turn in the ring.

"Yeah, easy," he said, trying to feign casualness but instead radiating nervousness like the sun radiates heat.

He grabbed the laptop from Ned and typed away for a few seconds before turning the screen to Michelle. On screen was a snapshot of DOOM, shitty 90's graphics and all. There was a watermark in the bottom corner.

Michelle eyed Peter with her patented Are-You-Fucking-Kidding-Me look, eyebrows raised and lips pressed tightly. If Peter wasn't uncomfortable before (which he was, very much, very very much) he was absolutely squirming now. Michelle knew she just had to dig a little deeper before she hit gold.

But Michelle was smart. She knew she wasn't going to learn anything from these two idiots, nothing useful at least. She could sit there all day and argue circles around them, but they wouldn't give her anything. What she needed was a highly susceptible Peter Parker who would spill the secret willingly. Considering, however, the dangers of being a superhero, especially in this day and age, Michelle doubted he would tell just anyone. Ned knew, obviously, and if the bookworm was a betting girl she'd bet May probably knew, too. He'd told his best friend and his parental guardian, but not her, which made sense. Who was she to him?

No one. Michelle was no one, to everyone. She was the silhouette in the hallway, making people check twice just to make sure she was, in fact, there. She was the decathlon captain whose name only half the team could remember—on a good day. She was the top student in her class, school, and district, whose teachers sometimes marked her absent because they didn't notice her. In essence, Michelle was a nobody, especially to Peter Parker.

Which meant she had to become somebody.

She had made her way to the exit before she turned slightly and said, "Hey Parker, you doing anything tonight?"

The sixteen year-old took a few seconds to compose his eloquent response. "Uhhhhh, no—wait! I meant yes. Ned and I are marathon-ing Indiana Jones tonight."

Michelle rolled her eyes at the absolute geekery. "Lame. I'll drop by around seven."

And then she was gone, leaving the two geeks to their "computer games".

 _Notes:_

Death Grips is fucking weird, dude.


	2. Chapter 2

"So what you are about to see is the brainchild of two of the greatest living visionaries since Da Vinci and Picasso. It is a masterpiece—nay! It is the masterpiece of masterpieces."

"That doesn't make any sense."

"It is..." Peter continued, undaunted by the blatant interruption; "...truly, the single most perfect piece of media ever produced in our lifetime."

"It came out before our lifetime."

"And tonight! We have the pleasure to share it with you."

"I'm sure the pleasure will be all mine."

"The audience will be silent during the movie proceedings."

"Proceedings? The courthouse is down the road, Parker."

"Peter!" Aunt May shouted from the kitchen. "Nachos are ready!"

"Yeah, just a minute! Uhh, don't start without me."

"No promises," Ned said.

§

"So...she's cute."

"She's just a friend, May, really."

"I believe you, I really do. I'm just saying, you know, once you two get to know each other, you never know. Your uncle and I, you know, we met in high school and—well, at the time I was dating Will Carver, but of course he was nothing compared to your uncle. But we didn't know each other either until we started talking, and... And of course the rest is history, as you know, we started dating and we got married."

"May, I—"

"Your parents on the other hand were a completely different story. They met, oh, what was it now? Summer of '82? Right, summer of '82, fell in love on sight, got married the next year. Beautiful story."

"Did you use the feta cheese or regular?"

May eyed him over the rim of her glasses. "What do you think?"

"Red peppers, right?"

She rolled her eyes. "Red peppers as always."

"Thanks, May," Peter said, giving her a quick hug from behind.

§

"So what's up with Peter?"

"What?" Ned's head shot up. "What do you mean?"

Michelle shrugged. "Seems like he's hiding something, don't you think?"

"What? No. Why would you think that? Peter's Peter, he's just Peter, you know."

"No, I don't know."

Ned laughed, then stopped. His attention was immediately seized by the TV, where he was setting up the movie that they had already set up.

"You were in Washington, weren't you Ned?"

Ned hesitated. "Um, yeah, Peter and I were in Washington during the decathlon."

"No, _you_ were in Washington. Peter wasn't."

"Yeah he was really sick that day," Ned explained quickly. He and Peter had worked on that story for a considerable time when they got home that weekend. A student disappearing in a completely different state and then reappearing the next day? That was liable to procreate some questions that neither of them wanted to answer. Questions like

"Is Peter Spider-Man?" Michelle asked simply.

Ned shook his head. He had been prepared for this, he knew it was coming, and now, it was _his_ turn to save Peter. "Nah."

Michelle set her book down. Clearly Ned and Peter were prepared for this kind of questioning, especially after their conversation in the Lab. She had to up her game.

§

"So you don't mind me having a girl in my room?"

"Well, that depends. Are you three going to get up to any funny business behind my back?"

"What! May, no, I would, you know, I would never, behind your back, I would, I wouldn't, I would never."

"Okay, okay," May nodded casually. "Just remember, if you have any questions, any questions at all, you can talk to me."

Peter smiled awkwardly. "Thanks, May."

She stroked his cheek affectionately. Peter was the single greatest thing that could have ever happened to her and Ben. She wished the circumstances had been a bit better, but regardless, Peter had been a blessing ever since.

"I'm happy for you, you know," May said, kissing the top of his head. "I know the Girl Subject has always been a bit touchy, but I'm happy."

"May she's just—"

"I know, I know, I know, she's just a friend. Still, I'm happy for you, okay?"

"Okay," he echoed quietly, letting her pull him into a tight hug.

§

"Did you know that when they were filming in the deserts of Tunisia, that Steven Spielberg was the only person on set who didn't get food sickness because he brought his own food. The man's a genius."

"Fascinating," Michelle muttered, flipping to the next page.

"And Indiana Jones was originally supposed to be Indiana Smith, but Spielberg changed it at the last second because Jones sounds cooler."

"It sure does."

"And—"

"Nacho time!" Peter stumbled into the room with a tray of steaming, cheesy chips. "We don't usually have dip with nachos so I didn't know if you wanted dip but if you want dip I can go grab some real quick it's no problem really." He set the tray down, looking to MJ for some kind of sign: Yes to dip? No to dip? Work with me, MJ, communication is key.

Without looking up, Michelle said, "Actually I've been vegan for the last week so I'll be eating these kale chips I brought with me." She held up a small bag of assorted kale chips. Ned and Peter winced at the disgusting abominations. As a general rule of thumb, kale chips are for people who have given up on life.

"Tositos are vegan," Ned said.

"No, Ned, the cheese.." Peter murmured, flopping down on his bed. The idea of having a girl in his room was finally dawning on him. They were just friends, obviously! But May said girls appreciated a bit of charm, so he was trying to give it his best shot.

Ned shrugged. "Whatever. I gotta pee before we get this show on the road."

Peter shot to his feet. "No, no, no, no you can hold it, Ned you can hold."

"I'll just be a minute," Ned whispered in passing, shooting him a wink before shutting the door.

It took Peter a few seconds to step away from the closed door and acknowledge that there were no longer three people in the room.

"And then there were two," Michelle quipped softly.

"Oh yeah like that book," Peter said, laughing stiffly. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, Agatha, uhhhhh..."

"Christie."

"Yes! Agatha Christie. Great writer, great book."

"I thought it was okay."

He cleared his throat. "Yeah I didn't like it that much, it was alright."

Michelle closed her book. "So tell me, Peter," she started, eyeing him suspiciously from across the room, "what was it like working with Tony Stark?"

Peter cleared his throat again; he should've grabbed a drink.

"Yeah it was cool, it was really cool. Mr. Stark's a cool guy, you know. Smart, too, really smart. Not smarter than you, of course, uh..." You fucking idiot. _Not smarter than you_. Who says that?! Just leave, just tell her you need to get a drink, and leave, and wait for Ned, and come back.

No! This is a girl, in your room. This is every teenage boy's dream, and you're squandering it!

She's obviously on to you, you need to get out of there immediately before you say something even more stupid.

Maybe she thinks Spider-Man is hot.

He wears a full body costume!

A full body costume that leaves little to the imagination.

You're dead. You're so dead.

"You good?"

"What?" He looked up. MJ was staring at him almost lifelessly. "You good?" she repeated.

"Yeah of course, I'm great, never better."

She tossed him the kale chips. "Here. They're good for you. It'll make you feel better."

"Thanks," Peter replied timidly. He picked up the bag cautiously, like it was an armed bomb or something.

Who is this? he thought. This isn't Michelle Jones. Michelle Jones would never offer someone her kale chips to make them _feel better_. It was weird, to Peter. He didn't know much about her, but he knew one thing: Michelle Jones wasn't nice.

Actually it occurred to Peter that he didn't know her at all. Who was this girl sitting in his room, prepared to watch all three (that's right, just _three_ ) Indiana Jones movies with him? That was something Peter intended to find out.

"Hey," he said, "has it been a minute yet?"

Michelle looked at him curiously. "A minute since what?"

Oh, right.

"Just, you know—hey, these are good," he said, popping a kale chip into his mouth as an excuse to keep it shut.

An act he immediately regretted. The actual chips themselves were, as expected, awful and disgusting and terrible and

"Oh my god!" Michelle cried, doubling over in laughter. "You actually ate one. I didn't think you'd actually eat one." She fell back laughing, tears pooling in her eyes. "You actually ate one! I can't believe it." She grabbed at her pained stomach, trying to compose herself.

But it was too funny. Even Peter started laughing after he made sure there was no evidence left in his mouth. He sat on the edge of his bed and laughed quietly at first. MJ was losing it on the floor. The sight of her rolling around with tears in her eyes, trying desperately to take even one breath between fits of laughter, it was hilarious, and Peter found himself laughing just as hard. In a few short seconds they were both on the floor laughing at the ceiling together. He knew that May could probably hear them and probably thought they were crazy, but he didn't care—this was great!

Ned, on the other hand; "What are you two doing?"

Laughing time was over. "Ned!" Peter scrambled to his feet. "Hey. What? Nothing."

"Okay... Ready to start the movie?"

"Yeah let's do it, let's get it on."

"What?"

"What? Nothing. Shut up. Start the movie."

§

It was midnight by the time Michelle left. Peter insisted on walking her home because "this neighborhood can be sketchy at night" but she wouldn't hear it. Regardless, Peter still felt the need to walk her to the front door.

"I took self-defense classes over the summer so I can basically fight anyone," Michelle explained.

"What if they have a gun? We have a lot of muggings around here."

"Relax, Parker," she said. "If anything happens I'm sure Spider-Man will save me."

Peter chuckled. "Uh actually I think he's taking a break tonight. You know he's a busy guy, and it's a big city. Tiring work."

"Do you usually know Spider-Man's nightly schedule?"

Whoops. "No. No, I just, we're friends and all, he and I, he just mentioned it earlier, like earlier this week, so I'm just passing the message." He scratched his neck; such a tell. "I just want you to be safe is all."

Michelle nodded. "Alright, Parker, I'll let it slide this time. See you at school tomorrow."

"Yeah see you at school," he replied, chivalrously opening the door and closing it behind her. He listened to her walk down the hallway until she was out of earshot. He thought about putting on the suit and tailing her, just to be sure she was safe. Not that he particularly cared about _her_ , but, Spider-Man cared about all citizens.

But that was Spider-Man; what did Peter care about?

 _Notes:_

¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


	3. Chapter 3

Michelle Jones had a problem.

Well actually her problem was the complete _lack_ of a problem. Peter—I mean, Spider-Man—had been tailing her ever since she left the apartment. Michelle expected this, given Peter's habit of going out of his way to help other people. There was no way he'd let her walk home alone in the middle of night, in downtown Queens.

What she didn't expect, however, was actually walking through downtown Queens in the middle of the night without once being stopped. She'd been walking for ten minutes and still hadn't been mugged, shot, kidnapped, not even glanced at! A Thursday night in New York City and all the criminals were in bed by 10:00, apparently. It ruined Michelle's whole plan.

But as we already know, Michelle Jones is smart—if only Peter knew that.

§

Peter had been trailing MJ for ten minutes now and still nothing had happened. At first he'd been on high alert, wary of any single person or persons that even looked at MJ the wrong way. But, after ten minutes of peace and quiet, he'd been reduced to staring at his phone while he effortlessly moved along the rooftops, glancing over the side of the buildings every minute or so to make sure she hadn't been mutilated or anything.

To be honest, Peter was expecting a lot more. New York state alone has the highest crime rate in America, so was it too much to ask for this girl to be in danger so he could save her already? That was the plan, anyway. Make MJ fall in love with Spider-Man first, then Peter.

That was Ned's plan anyway, when Peter first talked to him about.

"Chicks love getting saved. Remember when Tobey Maguire saved Kirsten Dunst in that one movie? They got together in the sequel, and she is so out of his league!"

Peter had no idea what movie he was talking about, nor did he ever bother to look it up, but Ned's logic was clearly soundproof. Michelle _was_ out of his league, so he needed to use every available asset to... Well actually he wasn't sure what the end game was. With Liz gone and May's approval, Peter figured he might as well try something, even if he still hadn't figured out what that Something was.

When he glanced over the side of the building for the umpteenth time, Peter noticed that MJ had crossed the street and was taking a right turn down 25th Street. That wasn't the right route to her house, (not that Peter knew where she lived or anything because that would be weird). He checked to make sure she was far enough down the street before he launched himself to the building across the street, landing quietly and then tip-toeing after her. She was walking at a much brisker pace now and Peter had a hard time keeping up without making any noise.

After less than a minute she took another turn down a dark alley. Before Peter could get her back in his sights again, he heard her scream.

§

When Michelle was done screaming, she waited. She could hear the heavy the footsteps running across the rooftops above her, closing in fast. Before she saw him, she heard the distinct sound of his homemade web shooters, and before she even had time to look up, Spider-Man was standing before her in all his spandexy glory.

"What's wrong? Are you ok? Is everything alright?" he asked quickly, looking up and down the alleyway for any signs of danger.

Michelle recognized that voice on the spot. Peter quickly realized his mistake.

"Oh, I mean—" he activated his enhanced interrogation voice modulator, "— _how can I assist you, citizen?_ "

"You can start by turning that stupid thing off."

" _I don't know what you mean. This is my natural voice_."

"Pretty deep voice for someone barely standing at 5' 8''."

" _5' 9''!_ "

"Peter Parker is not 5' 9''."

Despite the mask covering his face, Michelle knew his eyes were as wide as can be. At first he had been standing at full height, back straight and chin up, exerting his dominance over any bad guys that might have been around; but now he was like a deer in her headlights, frozen in that position by fear. He was like a statue, and Michelle mused on the idea of knocking him over and watching him shatter into a million little pieces.

Just like his secret.

"I'm going home. You don't need to follow me this time. I'll see you at school tomorrow."

And then she was gone. Peter remained frozen in the spot she had left him in. Behind the mask, his eyes were still as big as the moon shining over him.

§

"How did she figure it out?" Ned asked persistently. Peter shushed him harshly, closing the door to the Computer Science Lab before he reprimanded him.

"Keep it down! If she already knows then imagine who else does."

"Oh, right, sorry."

"It's fine, it's just been a stressful morning. I haven't seen her all day, I have no idea if she's told anyone, I don't even know how she found out."

"It must've been Washington. She didn't even notice you until Washington."

"But why now? Why didn't she tell me after Washington? It's been, like, a month."

Ned shrugged. "She's weird. What else is there to say?"

And like a stage show with perfect timing, the door to the Computer Science Lab burst open with as much flair and pomp as Michelle would allow for her grand entrance. "Hello, boys."

"Hey MJ," Ned waved. Now that he was no longer safeguarding Peter's Secret™, he didn't have to act so suspicious anymore.

"Hey Ned, how's it going?" Michelle asked, equally as friendly, beaming at the two boys across the room with a smile that Peter didn't even think existed.

"Same old, same old," Ned replied. This time he actually was playing DOOM on his laptop. Relationship politics bored him so he planned to be playing a lot of DOOM.

Peter, meanwhile, looked like he had a frog in his throat—or mouth. Like he literally looked as if there was a feral frog trapped in his mouth. Freaky.

"Hey Peter," Michelle said, taking a few steps into the room and closing the door behind her. She noted how much more nervous Peter looked now compared to before. Before, Peter held all the cards. Now they were playing a different game altogether, and by God was Michelle winning.

She sauntered over to the table and slid a $5 bill across to Ned. "Do you think you could run and grab me a slice of pizza from the cafeteria real quick?" She included a telling smile with the request.

Ned looked from the money, to Peter, to Michelle, to the money, then snatched it up and left. When the door clicked shut for the third time since he'd got there, Peter was utterly and completely alone.

Alone in a relative sense. He had planned on getting Ned to back him up when he denied what he thought Michelle was about to say, but without him there, it was a much less convincing argument.

"Last night was fun," Michelle said, starting off light. She wandered aimlessly around the room as she spoke, keeping a comfortable distance from Peter; she only had one shot to confirm everything she'd learned the night before, and she didn't want to scare him off.

"Yeah, yeah it was," Peter replied meekly.

"Your Aunt is nice."

"Didn't you already meet..." Peter trailed off when he noticed Michelle smirking.

It was an unnatural look on her, but still the minute upward curve of her lips put Peter at ease for some reason. He'd never actually appreciated the fact that MJ was drop-dead gorgeous. Before now he had always appreciated her for her genius, because they'd only ever known each other through decathlon. But at that time Peter was only ever ogling Liz. With her out of the picture, a spotlight had been shone on MJ.

"So, how did it start?" she asked. By now she was sitting in the corner of the room opposite Peter, basically as far away from him as she could be.

"You remember that field trip we took to Oscorp Tower?"

Michelle nodded.

"While we were there I got bit by this weird spider and now..." he gestured to himself. Michelle continued to nod, digesting the little packet of information.

"Have you run any tests on yourself?"

"Not really. As soon as I realized what was happening I sort of went straight for the superhero thing," Peter admitted sheepishly. "Ever since I got these powers I've wanted nothing more than to just be an Avenger."

"What's so great about being an Avenger?" Michelle asked, her voice tinged with just the slightest coating of disdain. "Seems all they do these days is destroy public property and drop cities from the sky."

"It's not like that, there's a lot going on for them right now," Peter said, trying his best to defend his heroes.

She looked unconvinced. Or maybe that was her resting expression? Honestly Peter found them hard to distinguish. Michelle Jones wasn't exactly a melting pot of emotions and expressions, but maybe that was what he liked about her.

Since when did he like things about her?

Well I guess there was that lip thing.

 _Get it together, Parker_.

"Did you really steal Captain America's shield?"

Peter's ears perked up like a dog; if he had a tail it would've been wagging. "Yeah, I did."

Michelle almost laughed when she said: "Prick."

Peter laughed a bit, too, but quieted down when he remembered where Cap had ended up. "It really has been rough for them. The bureaucracy of it all is just..." Peter shrugged. "But they've always had the best intentions, all of them. All of them."

Michelle nodded earnestly, recognizing Peter's passion for the subject. She had never seen him care for something so sincerely.

"You're not going to tell anyone, right?"

Michelle scoffed. "Not really. But I do want some personal time to study you. This isn't blackmail by the way."

"Personal time?"

"Yeah. Like some one on one tests. Strictly in the interest of science, of course."

"Of course," Peter repeated quickly, trying desperately to convince himself.

"Then it's settled." Michelle threw her hands up with a brief smile. "I'll talk to you later about concrete plans. See you soon, my little guinea pig." She added the last part with an ominous laugh before closing the door. Peter hadn't even noticed her cross the room, let alone open the door and leave.

But before he had time to ruminate on the magic act, Ned re-appeared, almost like he'd been waiting outside the door or something or whatever.

"So, how'd it go?" he asked disinterestedly, making a beeline for his laptop. He'd already heard the juicy parts while eavesdropping just outside the door, but he wasn't going to admit that to Peter. For now he was just going to play some DOOM, listen to Peter rave about this weird Personal Time thing with MJ, and essentially stay out of it. While Ned reveled in being Peter's Guy-In-The-Chair, he could do without being Peter's Shoulder-To-Cry-On.

"You do you buddy, she can't take that away from you," Ned murmured absently while Peter droned on about something or other.

It was going to be a long school year.

 _Notes:_

"michelle jones is smart" **back-up plan: just fucking scream**


	4. Chapter 4

The one-on-one tests with MJ were nothing like Peter expected. Mind you, Peter didn't really know what to expect, but when he found himself dead lifting the back-end of an 18-wheeler in the local trucker stop, he knew this wasn't it.

At first Michelle had actually been taking notes, scribbling vigorously and without pause in her little black book of secrets. But after a few minutes of note taking she resigned herself to simply watching, staring, one could say admiring and that one person would be Peter. All in all, from an outsider's perspective, it really did look like Michelle had taken a scientific interest in Peter and Spider-Man alike.

But Peter was looking for a bit more than that.

He couldn't really explain the feelings he had for MJ, or where'd they come from, or how Liz fit into the equation or why he only now was thinking about her or really why he was thinking about anything other than the Avengers right now but anyway! it was all very confusing for him, so for the most part, he just focused on lifting the truck.

"That truck is eighty-thousand pounds and you're lifting it like a sack of potatoes," Michelle commented. Her tone came off as disinterested, but Peter sensed there was some genuine arousal—wait, whoa, wrong word, who wrote this? Disgusting.

Anyway, Peter shot back with his own quip just in time: "Yeah well those potato sacks were too heavy for me before."

…

Look no one said his quips were any good.

After a few more minutes Michelle had him drop the truck. Despite only being a few feet in the air the back-end of the 18-wheeler landed roughly on the pavement, shaking the earth beneath their feet like a small earthquake. It only served to emphasize Spider-Man's strength even more, and Michelle had to stop her mouth from hanging open.

"Not bad, Parker," she said when the drool had cleared up.

"Not bad? You said that thing was eighty-thousand pounds."

"You've done more impressive things than lift a truck, Parker, chill."

Peter would've continued arguing if MJ's last sentence hadn't implied that she knew __a lot__ more about Spider-Man's exploits than she lead on.

In fact, in the weeks prior to this dead-lifting experiment, Peter had learned that MJ knew a lot more about Spider-Man than she lead on. Sometimes that took form of small allusions to some of Peter's bigger action pieces like the Airport Fight, but it also took the form of vast background knowledge regarding Peter's Internet notoriety; Michelle wouldn't admit it, but before she'd even considered the notion that Spider-Man might be a scrawny teenager from her school, she watched his YouTube videos religiously. She would always argue it stemmed from her fascination with evolutionary human biology, but Peter liked to theorize other viable reasons.

Regardless, it was inarguable that Michelle had a vested interest in Spider-Man, whether that interest be scientific or...otherwise.

§

Since Peter didn't have a license (for good reason) and Michelle didn't have a car, they walked home. The local truck stop was about ten miles from Michelle's apartment, so they had plenty of time to talk.

And of course Peter, ever the initiator, had started the conversation off softly with his interpretation of the new Star Wars films.

"I think what people don't realize about Episode VIII is how it connects back to Episodes I through III. Like, The Last Jedi completely vindicates those movies, and not only that, I think it enhances the experience retroactively. Everyone said those movies sucked but that's only because they just didn't get them at first, you know, they didn't really appreciate what George Lucas was trying to do with that trilogy. So then Episode VIII comes along, right, and it looks back at these movies and says 'This is what they meant' and you're like, Oh! That makes sense now. I totally get it. And that's also something I think speaks to the broader, like, concept of movies, you know? Not like movies in general but, like, franchises. A franchise—for example, Star Wars—or really just any franchise you want, maybe even a superhero franchise or whatever—so take that franchise, and watch the movies with that franchise in mind, right? If a movie is, like, say, the nineteenth movie in a franchise, you can't watch that movie without the first eighteen and the coming three and say 'Oh well it didn't make sense', because the reality is that these movies are like puzzle pieces in a bigger picture, and you need to wait for the puzzle to be finished before you can appreciate the whole thing. You know?"

Michelle looked at him with such a dispassionate expression that Peter's soul nearly almost ascended from his body and entered a new plane of existence where he screamed.

"No, I don't know," she said soberly.

Peter continued undaunted, "Movies are like books, right?"

This caught Michelle's attention, enough to merit a response. "Wrong."

"Well, like, movie series," he corrected.

"Movies are not like books."

"Hear me out."

"Nope."

They walked in silence for a few minutes after that. The cold wind was harsh in the outskirts, but Peter was sweating enough to fill a shallow bucket...a very shallow bucket.

Michelle on the other hand was staving off hypothermia, ineffectively. She rubbed her frozen arms through the thin material, generating as much friction as the laws of thermodynamics would let her.

"Do you remember what the third law of thermodynamics is?" she asked, trying to get her mind off the frigid temperature.

"Do you mean the actual third law or the titled third law?" Peter retorted, grinning inwardly. He had very few chances to prove his intellectual prowess to her, and he reveled in the few opportunities provided.

"Never mind."

Or nah.

They walked for a few more minutes before Peter finally noticed the shivering. It never occurred to him that regular people didn't have heated superhero suits under their normal clothing, especially normal people like MJ. She was shuddering fiercely, no longer bothering to rub her arms after her fingers had locked up from the cold.

"Here," Peter said, stripping off his coat and passing it to her. Michelle, for once in her entire life, swallowed her pride and took the coat without question. The cuffs were a bit far up her arm and the waistline was hiked up to her abdomen, but by God was it ever warm. She had to stop herself from hugging herself to absorb as much as the warmth as she possibly could.

"Thanks," she said when her jaw had ceased clattering.

"Don't mention it."

And mention it she did not. In fact, despite the display of warmth...haha...Michelle found herself at a loss for words. She wasn't used to most people around her being affectionate, let alone her human science experiment.

But Peter did have a hot streak of niceness; maybe she could test for that.

"So what other tests do you have planned?" Peter asked.

"Actually I think I'd like to go out on one of your routes tomorrow."

"What!" Peter swung around, stopping them in their tracks. "That's way too dangerous. I can't bring you along while I stop criminals."

"Stop criminals?" Michelle snorted then kept walking. "Listen, Parker, I watch the news. Spider-Man's daily routine usually consists of helping old ladies cross the street."

"But—"

"And it's also pretty bold of you to assume that I can't take care of myself."

That shut him up.

"Yeah but, like, what are you going to learn from going out with me?"

Oh never mind, he kept talking. I'm omniscient but I can't, like...I'm just the narrator.

"Well first I'm going to be studying your aerodynamics," she explained, "then I want to check out the tensile strength of that web stuff you made."

Peter's ears perked up. "You like my web shooters?"

"They seem rudimentary."

"Well yeah, you know, first draft, prototype, still working on it." Peter laughed airily. He rolled up his sleeve and eyed the shooters. They looked pretty refined. Sleek metal, innovative design, and a hint of YouTube tutorials.

"So what was up with Liz?"

Peter almost tripped. "Whaaat? What?"

"Liz. Your classmate. Decathlon teammate. Girl you stalked."

She's right but she shouldn't say it, Peter thought.

"What about her?" he asked.

"Were you dating her to get closer to her father so you could more easily infiltrate his gang and take them down?" Michelle asked flatly.

"Uhhhhhhh." Peter's brain stumbled. He focused real hard on the answer "No" but really couldn't bring himself to say it. Thinking back on it, with hindsight, going to Homecoming with Liz is the only reason he was able to put the Vulture away. Had he gone with anyone else, including nobody at all, Adrian Toomes would still be running weapons.

"Is that yes?"

"N-n-n-n-n-n-n-n.." It was on the tip of his tongue. Like the bus at the end of __The Italian Job__ , it was just about to tip over the edge and...

"No," he exhaled.

"Well you have to admit it was pretty convenient though."

The air was frigid but Peter was sweating healthily. They still had a long distance to go and this was not the topic he wanted to die on.

"Do you think about this stuff a lot?" he asked, diverting the conversation like Robert Frost Rd.

"Only recently," Michelle replied. "Discovering that you are Spider-Man helped me put a lot of stuff into perspective, and it answered a lot of questions. So yes I've been thinking about this a lot."

Peter's ego nearly burst. MJ? Thinking about him? In perspective? Nice. But it also begged the question that he hated asking: was she actually thinking about him, or was she thinking about Spider-Man.

"When did you know it was me?" he asked.

"What, like when did I know you were Spider-Man?" She thought about it for less than a second. "Easy. Washington. You don't just disappear for a whole day without raising suspicions. Not to mention, that whole I-Know-Spider-Man thing didn't help."

That made sense. Peter originally thought the Washington Monument thing had covered up his tracks, but alas, nothing got past MJ. Her attention to detail is why she replaced Liz in the first place. Replaced her on decathlon team, I mean. Just decathlon. It's not like MJ was filling in for Liz in any other way, especially not in regard to Peter and his personal life...or anything.

§

It was another thirty minutes before they were downtown. The buildings shielded them from the wind so the temperature rose a bit. Michelle was no longer shivering and Peter's body temperature had finally reached an equilibrium. They both walked comfortably in the silence, thinking different things to themselves.

Michelle was the first to break the silence and think aloud, "So is Spider-Man really an Avenger?"

"Well!" Peter started; "Well I mean, not __technically__ no, but I-I-I don't think that's the point, you know?"

"Well the point we are discussing is being an Avenger so yes the point is being an Avenger so is Spider-Man an Avenger?" Michelle glanced sideways.

Peter didn't answer at first. She saw a literal brainstorm forming over his head, raining down different answer-droplets. Which would he choose? Should Michelle guess now? Or should she let herself be surprised, if just for Peter's sake? Decisions, decisions.

"No, he's not an Avenger. But! He's going to become one, soon."

He played it safe; somewhat admirable.

"And when is 'soon'?" she pressed.

"Like, whenever the next alien invasion happens, you know."

Michelle nodded. "The next alien invasion. Right."

"Yeah and then Mr. Stark'll call me and I'll save the city..or whatever." He said it very casually. Air quotes over "casually". He even scratched the back of his head for added effect.

The boy was truly a walking 80's caricature.

"Well I look forward to observing you in action," Michelle said. "Hopefully the next alien invasion comes soon because I need all the data I can get at this stage."

"I hope that too! That would be so cool."

She laughed slightly at that. His humor was like water on limestone: always eroding you, wearing you down, until you have to accept it, appreciate it, let it take you away in the current. Michelle was just beginning to crack.

When they had covered considerable distance downtown, they came upon an unexpected scene. It looked like an armed robbery currently in progress, with three gun-touting strongmen hustling the cashier of a gas station. There was no one else around, and the setting could not be more perfect.

"Wanna see those aerodynamics in action?" Peter asked, already stripping out of his regular clothes. Michelle watched in somewhat aroused fascination as Peter made quick work of his jeans and jacket, getting completely in-costume—mask and all—in less than 10 seconds. He stuffed everything into his backpack and handed it to her. "Be right back."

And then he was gone. Michelle followed slowly after him, watching him from a distance. He made a show of entering, swinging the front door open with his webs then literally swinging in. Two of the strongmen started firing off shots.

Michelle bit her tongue. Peter jumped and narrowly avoided a 6-inch slug in his gut. They fired off round after round, apparently oblivious to the apartments surrounding them.

Every round came closer to hitting Peter. Every shot they took appeared to miss only at the last second. Michelle could only stand and watch. A few more back flips and a few more near misses later, the two strongmen were out of ammo. While they reloaded, the third one kept Peter pinned.

I need to help, Michelle thought. Peter was fighting close range, in an enclosed area, against shotguns—he was dead. She had to do something.

"Hey!" she screamed from across the street. "Hey guys!"

Screaming seemed to be her plan every time.

She waved her arms. "Hey!" They couldn't hear her over the shotgun. She needed to get closer.

Michelle ran across the street, standing on the sidewalk just outside the gas station. "Hey fuck heads over here!"

The third burglar had finished firing when he noticed the noise outside. Shoving his friend, he pointed out the window. "Take care of it."

The second one nodded and stormed off. The first one kept Peter pinned down.

Peter himself poked his head over the Slurpee counter and ascertained his situation. "Okay, okay, okay, three guys, all armed, cops are on their way after a quick call from Karen, so, just gotta wait 'em out."

" _ _I'm afraid not, Peter. One of the assailants is approaching Miss. Jones with lethal intent__."

"Lethal intent? What?" He poked his head up higher and looked past the two remaining strongmen. "Wait where'd the third guy go?"

Karen highlighted an area in his field of vision. It was outside, on the sidewalk, just past the gas pumps. It was Michelle, waving her arms and screaming like she was being attacked by a swarm of bees—but it wasn't bees, it was an armed burglar.

Everything after that happened very quickly. Peter launched like a rocket from his hiding spot, using his webs to sweep across the floor, seemingly out of sight of the other two men. With another web he spring-boarded off the ground and shot himself through the front window, crashing through the glass like a rock and landing outside with a thud, like a rock.

Michelle stood her ground as the third man marched on. He was just about the pass the last gas pump, leaving nothing between him and her. There was no one else walking down the street, no cars passing, no one checking from their windows; she was alone. She was always alone, but now, she was more alone than she'd ever been.

It's not enough to just be alone.

"Wait!"

The man pulled the trigger, but Peter was quicker. The shotgun fired off in some unseen direction as Peter crashed into the man and took him to the ground. They scuffled for a few seconds, but Peter came out on top, sticking the man's hands to the ground with webbing.

"Threat averted," Peter mumbled, standing up.

" _ _Not quite__."

Peter's head shot up. Half a second later, the powder in the shell detonates, firing off a hundred or so small pellets, a quarter of which lodge themselves in Peter's shoulder at incredibly high speeds, creating an impact so strong that it puts Peter on his back.

On the ground, Peter fires his web and hits the barrel of the shotgun perfectly. When the trigger is pulled, the entire the chamber explodes, conveniently knocking out both men in range.

"Threat...averted," the hero manages to whisper between breaths. In his head, Karen agrees.

"Oh shit," Michelle reacted quickly, running over to the masked fifteen year old. She dropped to her knees and summoned every piece of media relating to medical procedures that she'd ever absorbed. A shotgun shell to the shoulder, multiple pieces of shrapnel, heavy bleeding, his high adrenaline only pumping the blood out faster.

"You need to calm down," Michelle instructed, her voice shaking ever so slightly. She straightened it out and repeated, "You need to calm down."

"I can't do that, I can't do that, I can't do that," Peter repeated on a panicked loop, frantically looking everywhere but his shoulder.

Michelle ripped off her (Peter's) jacket and laid it under his head. He's shaking. She's kneeling in blood now. The costume is torn.

"Hey Michelle, I don't feel so good."


	5. Chapter 5

Michelle dragged Peter to the dumpster behind the building. She propped him up against it and inspected the damage.

"12-gauge birdshot to the shoulder, ten to twenty yards, you took about a quarter of the spray."

"It doesn't feel like a quarter," Peter groaned.

"Keep it down," Michelle reprimanded. She covered the spread with his t-shirt then tied it in place with strips of his jacket to create a makeshift tourniquet. That blocked most of the bleeding, but it was a temporary fix at best. The actual pellets and shrapnel were still inside of him, which meant he needed actual medical attention.

But that was off the table. The police were already creating a blockade around the gas station, and if anyone saw a bleeding Spider-Man, he'd be sent to the ER and never allowed back in costume again. Not to mention the questions they would ask. All of which meant that Michelle needed to get both of them somewhere safe and out of sight.

"Can you walk?" she asked. Over her shoulder there were flashlight beams and noisy police officers. So, without waiting for her patient to answer, Michelle hoisted Peter up to his feet. Working through his protests, she used some more of his jacket for a makeshift arm-sling. With the 16 year old effectively patched up, she threw his arm around her shoulders and set off.

It was still cold out. Michelle didn't notice, what with the distracting task at hand, but Peter was not so easily spared. A dangerous amount of blood had leaked from his body and the side effects were only getting worse. Walking became a more difficult task when his legs started numbing, and breathing was a whole challenge on its own.

Michelle noticed almost instantly. Peter was relying on her more and more as they progressed, more and more of his weight falling into her. On top of that, the only thing worth listening to as they walked was his breathing; shallow, ragged, and limited. Peter didn't have the energy to cross Queens, and Michelle didn't have the strength.

Speaking of Queens, did you know that Queens is actually the safest borough in New York City? Lowest crime rates across the board. Which is a statistic Michelle was thinking about when she noticed the two men blatantly following behind them. Of course, crime is a common occurrence in New York, and Michelle always comes prepared with pepper spray and a hidden hunting knife. But those precautions became moot the second she started dragging an injured superhero.

She wasn't _just_ at a physical disadvantage, though. While carrying an injured person around is a huge disadvantage in the first place, carrying around an injured person whose sole purpose in life is to fight crime, well...

"Give me your web blasters," Michelle whispered as discreetly as possible.

"Web shooters," Peter corrected faintly.

"Just give them to me!"

Peter didn't have enough blood to argue further, so with much effort, he removed his web shooters and handed them to Michelle, who put them on. "Spider-Girl," he mumbled to himself. She shushed him and kept walking.

It wasn't until they reached Michelle's street that the web shooters came in handy. The two assailants had followed them for several miles, and in that time, three more unidentified goons had begun tailing them. A sixth was walking towards them, just fast enough that the teens would run into him just before they reached the apartment lobby door. All in all, they were trapped.

So Michelle stopped.

Peter looked around deliriously. "Where are we?"

Michelle set him down on a nearby bench. "51st street."

"Such a cliché," he muttered.

The six men were closing in as Michelle checked Peter's wound on the bench. The shirt/jacket combination had stopped some of the bleeding, but the wound itself still needed to be closed.

She kept the six combatants in her peripheral vision the entire time. Three approaching at 1 o'clock, two at 3 o'clock, one at 9 o'clock. All of them probably armed, With What being the question. Blunt objects she could handle, knives were another story, and don't even get her started on guns.

Using the last strip of Peter's jacket, she tightened the shirt around his shoulder. He groaned. It would hold, for a bit.

Finally, when the two men were close, she shot the first one in the face—or, she tried to. When one of them was in range, Michelle had swung around, aimed, and fired the web shooters directly at Goon #1's face. The sticky substance hit the wall five feet from its target and stuck.

The six men reacted in turn. When they revealed their weapons, Michelle counted three switchblades, two baseball bats, and a hand gun.

"Shit shit shit shit shit" Michelle cursed as she took aim at the gun-wielder and fired wildly. Acting entirely on instincts she decided to veto aiming and opted instead for a spray-and-pray strategy, emptying the canisters of their webbing straight into the gunman's face. The gooey material struck him all over, including his eyes. In retaliation, he fired in Michelle's general direction, discharging the entire clip in a furious rampage.

When all was said and done, the gunman was covered in so much sticky, gooey, white webbing that he had to legally change his name to Dillion Harper. And as an added bonus, he managed to accidentally shoot the sixth guy.

That left 4 targets. With renewed morale, Michelle took aim at her first victim and pulled the trigger on the web shooters.

"Empty," one of the targets taunted as air sputtered out of the barren canisters; Michelle had shown her hand, and now she was staring down the barrel of a Royal Flush.

She dropped the web shooters and reached for the pepper spray in her back pocket, but the men were too close. One of them lunged and grabbed her, snatching the pepper spray for himself and tossing it down the road. The other three surrounded her, barely paying any attention to the nearly passed-out Peter on the bench.

"We got word that two punks stopped a robbery over on Queens St.," one of the thugs said. "Those were our guys you put away. And that," he pointed to the gun-shot victim down the road, "was my brother."

Without a rhyme or reason, Michelle responded with: "Like, your actual brother? Or when guys say their best friend is their 'brother' but they're not actually related? Just seems weird to say that about a dead guy, right?"

It just so happened that the thug she was mocking was one of the knife-wielding thugs, and he happened to have the shortest temper in the bunch—although, you would too if someone just shot your actual brother.

The knife-wielding brotherless maniac raised his aforementioned 6-inch stainless steel with real ivory handle knife above Michelle's head in a very dramatic fashion. The hopeless teen did her part to cry and beg, a first for Michelle, but to no avail. She struggled in the grasps of these convicts and murderers, screaming desperately for anyone to hear her, to see her, to help her, to acknowledge her just know that she's there just say something please

" _Instant Kill Mode activated_."

§

Michelle shoved open her apartment door as quietly possible. It got stuck sometimes so she had to be extra careful to only shove it lightly, lest anyone wake up. Not that it really mattered, considering her parents were traveling salespeople who were home maybe two months out of the year. As a child it was definitely a difficult dynamic for Michelle, but she grew into it, or so she says.

Regardless, the apartment was empty that month; entering the place quietly was just a habit.

She collected some supplies from the bathroom before dragging Peter in the direction of her room. To play his part, Peter pointed at the various family photos on the wall and commented on Michelle's youth. For her part, she ignored it. With the lack of blood in his body he wasn't making enough sense to merit her attention anyway. Plus, she was a bit distracted to say the least.

Anyway, here comes the fun part where I get to describe the bedroom of an eccentric teenage girl. I bet you're picturing the mountains of books and doodle pads, walls covered from floor to ceiling in tasteful posters, and of course a very quaint reading desk in the corner because no eccentric teenage girl goes without one.

"Room's kinda empty," Peter commented when Michelle shoved him onto her bed. He was right. The room itself was small, with her bed and side table being the only discernible furniture. The walls and ceiling were white and devoid of decoration, creating the illusion of a prison cell in Peter's mind. There were no stacks of books, papers, or notepads. The closet was closed. The blinds were drawn. There was a single bedside lamp that Michelle switched on, dimly illuminating the arid room.

"I'm not here very often," Michelle explained as she worked. Peter's blood had dried and crusted over, somewhat sealing the t-shirt in place. "I spend most of my time at the library, or school." She grabbed some scissors and started cutting through the material. "My parents are gone most of the time so there's no point in staying." When the t-shirt was removed, she wiped up the excess blood with a wet rag; her hands were shaking. "I just crash here. Most of the time." Popping the cap off a bottle of rubbing alcohol, she drained it on the open wound. Peter opened his mouth to scream in paralyzing agony, but Michelle was quick to shove a pillow between his teeth. "These are thin walls." She poured the rest of the alcohol over a pair of surgical tweezers and tossed the bottle.

"Okay, listen," she said, standing over Peter and looking down at the dangerously pale teenager anxiously. "I'm gonna need to rip the suit."

Peter groaned softly, but with the pillow still in his mouth, made no further objection. Taking that as a yes, Michelle grabbed the scissors again and cut open the suit around the wound. With the wound exposed, she went to work.

Armed with the tweezers and her phone flashlight, Michelle carefully picked out the small pellets in Peter's shoulder. Her patient did his best to stay still, but that was no easy task with half your blood missing and a metal instrument stabbing your fresh gunshot wound. Michelle apologized over and over, "Sorry sorry sorry, I'm really sorry," as she dug the tweezers further into his pulsing flesh. Blood was pouring out of the open wound, covering Michelle's hand and obscuring her vision.

"Okay now I'm really _really_ sorry," she said before she left the room and returned with a second bottle of rubbing alcohol. Peter nearly jumped and ran when he saw, but Michelle held him down with all her strength and emptied the second bottle. "Almost done," she assured him while she did. That didn't do much for Peter, who was on the verge of tears as this girl pushed past bone and muscle to get what she needed, then slowly dragged that small copper pellet out of his shoulder, dragging it past exposed nerves and tissue until finally it reached open air.

That was the last one. The two teenagers sighed collectively as Michelle dropped the tweezers and fell backwards onto the bed.

"Okay," she said, rising from the bed. "Okay, almost done." Those two words became her mantra while she set about her work. A bit more cleaning with the wet rag and the wound was ready to be dressed. She had Peter sit up while she wrapped the gauze around his shoulder.

"I suppose I can't send you home like this," she reflected, trying to sound indifferent but coming off concerned.

Peter released the pillow from his mouth. "It's fine. This isn't the first secret I've kept from May."

"All the more reason," Michelle said. "Plus, you've lost way too much blood. I'd be surprised if you can still walk, let alone swing yourself home. I have a fully functioning couch with your name on it, Parker. Call May and tell her you're spending the night at Ned's."


	6. Chapter 6

Michelle let Peter borrow some of her dad's old clothes. Her parents used the apartment for storage mainly, so they had boxes of old clothes dating back to when Michelle was born. In those boxes you could also find her baby clothes, and some pictures from when she grew up. While Michelle set up the couch for Peter, he rifled through some of the old photos.

Younger MJ was smiling. She looked happy. Her parents stood by her side at her 6th grade graduation and smiled with her. Later photos of the same event revealed friends by her side and teachers who probably loved having her in their class. It was odd seeing MJ surrounded by so many people, when Peter only ever saw her alone.

"Who are these guys?" Peter asked, handing her a photo of Young MJ and her friends. Michelle studied the photo carefully, taking her time with every inch.

"Just some old friends," she said offhand, tossing the picture back to Peter.

"Do you still talk to any of them?"

"Not anymore."

She threw the comforter over the couch, but it only covered about three quarters of it. Michelle reviewed the situation with a frustrated glare. "This is fucking ridiculous," she said. "You know what, take my bed. I'll take the couch."

Peter opened his mouth to protest but Michelle made some weird shouting noise that also kind of sounded like "No!" but Peter couldn't tell exactly. Instead he let her push him into her room again and then shut the door between them.

The sheets had been washed and the hardwood floor had been mopped, clearing all left over blood. The room was back to its prison cell vibe, especially now that the blinds were half-open, creating vertical lines of moonlight on the bed. Peter stood and quietly observed the whole ordeal; it almost dawned on him that this room was somewhat indicative of MJ's life. He'd never actually met her parents, he'd never even seen them at school events. His Aunt May had been to every graduation since he was 4 years old. Did MJ know that luxury?

It was killing him. Like a malignant virus eating him up inside, this curiosity towards MJ actually pained him...

...or maybe it was the gunshot wound...he did take a lot of pain medication...

But he had to know! What, specifically? Figure that out on the way!

He swung the bedroom door open and marched down the hallway. When he was in the living room, he started, "MJ, I—"

She was gone. The apartment was empty again.

 _The window_. He leaped over the couch. The window was open. It wasn't open when they entered. It also lead to a fire escape. Convenient.

Peter climbed out the window; it was the first time in a while that he climbed out on the ground, instead of on the ceiling. Even though Aunt May had discovered his identity, Peter still delighted like a child in climbing through his bedroom window "like an actual spider".

Unfortunately he'd be doing everything the regular way for a bit. He climbed the fire escape step by step. He used his working arm to pull himself up using the banister. It was a grueling (and some would say embarrassing) activity.

When Peter finally reached the top, he was winded. His body was still recovering from a major loss of blood, and he'd been totally stinting on cardio recently. It took him ten whole seconds to regulate his breathing, and even then his heart was still beating a mile a minute. But he ignored all that moving forward. He could see the tent from where he was. On the other side of the roof, red, with a blue tarp over the top, and a hanging electric lamp.

As he moved forward, he noticed something else.

"Hey, MJ," he said, standing at the entrance of tent. It was wide open, letting the smoke filter out, allowing Peter to see the entire interior; plush pillows, several blankets, literal stacks of books, the lamp, water bottles, snacks, and MJ, leaning again a pile of pillows set against her book stack, book in hand, joint between her lips, and the most disheartening set of eyes Peter ever had the pleasure of setting his own [eyes] on.

"I figured you'd go straight to sleep," she said, joint only tipping slightly out of her mouth. "You have lost enough blood to put a regular teenager out of commission. I looked it up;" she raised the book in her hand, _Royal Commission For Injury Among Gun Owners._

"Yeah I guess I'm just not your average teenager," he said tensely.

"You seem tense, Parker," MJ observed acutely. Before Peter could respond she waved her hand to silence him, then used that same hand to beckon him in. With initial hesitation, Peter obeyed and sat just inside, in front of the opening. MJ leaned on her pillow stack on the opposite side.

Silence lasted for a few seconds. Peter eventually coughed and said, "Smokey."

Michelle raised her eyebrow. "Can you guess why."

Peter laughed dryly. His mouth was actually dry, it was _actually_ pretty fucking smokey.

The cozy bookworm took another drag and blew in Peter's direction. "It's been a stressful night. I decided I needed one. Does that bother you?"

Peter coughed again. _I'm gonna suffocate._ "No." He shook his head and smiled benignly.

"Do you want one?"

 _Oh fuuuuuuuuuuuck me._

"Su—"

"Don't say yes if you don't want one."

"No, I—"

"Like you're only, what, 16? Seems kind of young to have your first drug experience, you know?"

"You offered—"

"But arguably that's also an age that one would expect someone to be able to make decisions for themselves so I, as an adult, am offering you a mature decision that I can conscientiously expect you to understand and consider thoughtfully."

"...Okay, yes, I'll take the drugs."

Michelle sat silently for a few seconds and then, "You'll 'take the drugs'." And then she started laughing like really fucking hard. Her book fell carelessly out of her hand and the joint in her other hand danced around dangerously as she laughed. She was literally running out of air as she laughed, gasping like a beached seal.

After a few long moments of laughter, Michelle breathed calmly, choking up a bit but managing to hold herself together. "Okay I'll get you your drugs, dude." She grabbed a book behind her and opened it. It was empty. It was a fake book. She hid her drugs inside fake books. What's happening.

She tossed Peter a fresh joint and a lighter. The lighter was pink with rainbows. What the fuck.

"Come on, boy, I don't wanna be the only one smoking. It's lame smoking alone."

Peter pressed the paper to his lips and lit the other end. Unfortunately Peter is a pure, sinless child who doesn't know how to smoke, so he kind of just held the joint there and did nothing. Michelle watched him in awe, heralding his stupidity like the second coming.

"You have to inhale," she said. She mirrored Peter's technique with her own joint but this time she inhaled and sucked in a waft of smoke then blew it out. "Okay? Come on, you've built tech that even Tony Stark is impressed by. This isn't rocket science, which you are fluent in."

Peter nodded and tried again. He inhaled and immediately choked. The paper flared brightly and the flower beneath glowed like hot coal, the entire operation like a firework combusting and exploding into a massive plume of smoke which Peter had just inhaled into his virgin throat. Fire metaphors aside, it felt like a million needles stabbing his throat and his lungs over and over, all while hot garbage permeated his breath and taste buds like sewage gas.

Spider-Man himself fell onto his side and choked. Michelle was on her feet and at his side, holding a water bottle in his face. He grabbed the water and she grabbed the joint. She sat back down and watched him down the entire bottle in a few short seconds. He tossed it through the opening.

"You good?" she asked.

"Totally," he responded, voice noticeably hoarse. He moved onto his back and flexed his injured arm. Dr. MJ had done a fine job.

"What's it like getting shot?" Michelle asked.

"It's..." Peter thought out loud, "It's, you know, it's, it's, it fucking hurts. Like, not at first. But once the adrenaline wears off and the shock sets in, _wow._ It's crazy. And seeing your blood, that much of it, it's, it's, I don't know it's terrifying." He thought back to a recent memory. "It's scary being vulnerable like that. Being useless. It's... Should I tell Ned?"

"What? Yes. Obviously tell your best friend."

"You don't think it might freak him out?"

"Of course it'll freak him out. He'll also probably love it. He loves the exciting exploits of Spider-Man, especially the enticing ones."

"You're probably right."

"What? I _am_ right."

Peter chuckled. "I shouldn't doubt the captain."

"That's right mother fucker. I know how to get you into practice now, no more skipping. And with you there, I'm going to grind all that information into your puny human brain without mercy or remorse. You will know everything and anything when I'm done with you. You will be the Adam to my Doctor Frankenstein."

"What?"

"What? Frankenstein. By Mary Shelley? Seriously? We read it in 10th grade."

"Well you didn't have to read it, you just had to do a book report, right?"

Michelle stared in stunned silence. _This is fucking ridiculous_.

"Do you read any of the material we're given?"

"Well I did read _Moby Dick_ because..." he stopped to laugh. "Because..." chuckle "because..."

"Because ' _Dick_ '!" Michelle shouted.

Peter laughed even harder in response. He tried to nod at the same time but he couldn't move his body while he laughed as hard as he did. He laid there like a giggling child and he wouldn't stop.

"Would you shut the fuck up, Jesus Christ, you only took one hit!"

Peter was about to laugh even harder at that but he stopped himself. He summoned all the will in his body to silence his laughter; it was like holding in a fart.

"I'm good, I'm cool," he said. His eyes were as red as his suit. He stared upwards at nothing in particular.

"It's really warm in here," Peter said. "It's cold outside but it's warm in here."

"There's a heater under the books. There's an outlet near the door, so I cut a whole in the tent and fed some cable through to plug it in. It's quiet and doesn't heat up that much. Perfect for an enclosed environment."

"That's sick," he commented. "You have a really sick set up out here. Why not set it up in your apartment? It's not like your parents would mind, right?"

"Thanks, Parker."

Peter shot up. "Oh no no, I didn't mean, you know—"

"Yeah yeah yeah, it's fine. Lie down, dumb ass... I didn't set it up inside the apartment because I don't like the apartment. It's just there to remind me that they're not here." She puffed and exhaled. "Plus, I can't smoke in there."

"Ah."

"And it's like, what? This isn't a cool set up?" She gestured awkwardly around her. "Rate my set up."

Peter could only manage a strong thumbs-up.

"Exactly! This is perfect. This is everything I need. I don't need friends or family, I just need pillows and books and more pillows."

"I think you might be taking that sentiment too far."

"What! Explain yourself, Parker."

"I just mean, you _do_ need friends and family. Y'know that's why you joined the Decathlon team, right?"

Michelle meditated on her answer. Hesitantly: "Yeah I guess you're right. I do need my friends."

"Who are your friends anyway?"

"Oh you know... Ned. Liz, for a bit. Spider-Man, now. And I think that's it."

"I think you forgo—"

"Oh shit! Betty. My girl Betty. We met during study period when we tried to take out the same book at the library. She is so cool! She knows literally everything about pre-Victorian medical practices in Europe."

"That's like so specific."

"I also met this kid in Brooklyn, Miles, in a McDonalds. Cool guy. Brooklyn is such a cool place."

 _You got heart, kid. Where you from? "Queen's." Brooklyn._

"Brooklyn, huh? Lotta interesting people from Brooklyn."

"Yeah but I still prefer Queens. Most of my friends are from Queens. I don't have any friends from Manhattan but I am super okay with that."

"What's with that Manhattan hate?"

"Manhattan Hate. Manhatetan."

Peter glanced sideways at Michelle. "What."

She glanced sideways back. "How are you handling the grief from the death of your Uncle?"

Peter stared back numbly at her. "I'm—I don't think I am."

"Yeah that tends to happen," she said suddenly and quickly. "I've never experienced it really. Grief. I don't really know enough people to see them die. What's it like?"

"It's like...watching someone turn into dust in your arms."

"Vivid. Harrowing."

"It's like watching the entire world fall apart around you. And there's nothing you can do. It's already happened. You can only stand back and watch it unfold."

"That's—"

"How does it feel to be, like, alone...all the time?"

Michelle sat up to look at him. Peter was lying flat on his back. He stared back at her, casting his gaze just over the fresh wound. Michelle's eyes were drawn to it as she answered.

"It doesn't feel like anything. It's just..." she shrugged, "it just is. And you know it's there. You know, it's like your shadow. It's there. But it's not really _there_. It surrounds you but you can still move. It just moves with you."

"Do you think if we weren't high we'd give more direct answers?"

"Absolutely."

"Where do you get this stuff?"

Michelle gawked at the joint in her hand. "Oh yo I just steal it from parties. Yeah I go to parties, make some toast, go downstairs, and just fill bags with the weed that people left behind. I haven't bought my own stuff for years."

Peter gawked with her. "You're insane."

Michelle just laughed. It was like an airy breeze. Peter could feel it through the smoke.

"Being alone sucks but it's also easy. I bet being Spider-Man is pretty difficult when you have friends and family to worry about."

Peter laughed at that. "Ideally Spider-Man is a rogue vigilante who has no friends or family."

"Mmm but you and I, and Ned, and May, and Adrian "the Vulture" Toomes, know that's not true."

"Right, so I just gotta keep it contained to that tight circle of people and I'm good."

"One of those tight circle guys is in prison."

"Tight circle _persons_ because it might be a girl."

" _Bitch_!" Michelle tossed at pillow at the Spiderboy. "It's the Vulture!" She missed and Peter didn't even flinch.

"I am 100% certain that Adrian Toomes, Liz's father, will do the good and honest thing and not reveal my secret to the criminal world."

Michelle paused in awe for a few seconds. Never, never ever ever, in her entire life, had she heard something so god damn stupid. She paused in awe for a good several long decent seconds to really laser-focus in on the actual words that had willingly been deposited into this conversation by this particular informant laying peacefully across from her, with consent. "You. Dumb. Bitch." Michelle so rightfully responded.

"I just feel like you're not seeing it from my perspective."

"No, no, no," she snapped her fingers and made a quick line in the air with the same fingers, very dramatic; "No, fuck your perspective. The Vulture is a criminal who will do criminal things because he is—wait for it—a criminal."

"I just feel—"

"Is this a Liz thing?"

"What!"

"Are you defending her father because you think you still have a chance with her?"

Peter froze. Not, like a deer in headlights froze. More like a computer when you're running _Minecraft_ and _Overwatch_ at the same time, I don't know why you would but let's just say you did, and then your computer froze and crashed—that's Peter. His brain was fried. You have to remember that he's a sinless child of God who had never done drugs before...ergo, ya boy was tweaking. He had no idea what the hell was going on anymore. The shit was on the fan and it was dropped and

"Peter!" Michelle snapped her fingers. _Snap. Snap._

 _Snap._ "What?"

"Are you okay?"

"I am at a respectable temperature, yes."

"You're fried."

"Like a motherboard."

"That's such a geeky thing to say."

"You've called me geeky before, I'm living up to it."

Michelle could only laugh. Peter laughed with her.

It was quiet after that. Michelle had reclined into her books. Peter was floating elsewhere on a cloud, blissfully ignorant of the pain shooting through his arm like buckshot. They both closed their eyes slowly, drooping. In no time at all, Peter was snoring softly.

Michelle leaned forward, still awake. There was a full moon out that night; the light spilled in through the opening, drowning Peter in a silver glow. The bookworm stared helplessly across the sea of pillows. Waves danced in her stomach while she watched. She thought wistfully about the song where the spider goes up the water spout.

But again the thought came back to her. That thing Peter had mentioned. About turning to dust in someone's arms. It stayed with Michelle. It never quite seemed to go away.


	7. Chapter 7

Michelle awoke with the cold morning breeze and bustle of downtown New York. The flap to the tent had been left open quite haphazardly and the mornings in her neighborhood leaned towards the colder side of the spectrum. Staten Island was the only borough that ever got any sun, while the rest of the sleeping city was left to squander the heat it could retain. Of course by daytime they would begin to collectively reject that same heat, but for now it nourished them.

The tipsy teen searched for her other half in a daze. She'd last seen Peter snoring away at the edge of the tent. That morning, he was nowhere to be found in or out of the tent.

The morning air nipped at Michelle's neck while she stood on the edge of the building. It was a considerable drop to the bottom, How many feet? Michelle didn't want to count. She could, but she didn't want to. Instead she looked up and down the street, looking for any sign of red and blue.

"Where are you, fucker?" she mumbled tiredly under her breath. There wasn't a hint of him anywhere, not a single trace. Michelle doubted that even Sherlock Holmes himself could solve this missing persons case.

On the other hand, he might've just gone back to his apartment. It's early enough in the morning that May might believe he ditched Ned and went back home late at night. However, Michelle was only guessing at the time. At that time of the year it's often hard to tell what time it is, weather conditions considered.

Further analysis of the situation was giving Michelle a headache. Her head was still throbbing like a beating heart from last night, and the glare of the rising sun definitely didn't help. It was breaching the Eastern horizon, where the buildings were low enough to allow a swath of bright sunlight to pour in. The decathlon captain shielded her eyes and carefully landed back onto the flat surface of the roof. The second she landed, she heard a familiar _thwip thwip thwip_ heading in her direction.

"I'm sorry," she heard him say. Her hands remained at her face to guard her eyes from the besieging sun. "I heard a car alarm go off down the street and it woke me up and I wanted to go see if everyone was okay but they had a flat tire so I had to lift the car but one of the lug nuts got stuck so he had to go ask his buddy if he could—"

One of Michelle's hand clamped over Peter's mouth like his very own webbing. "I get the idea. You had Spider-Man stuff to do." Michelle peeked through her fingers and sure enough he was wearing the tattered suit with a jacket over it. Disgusting, ugly, a disgrace to fashion, but when he took his mask off Michelle almost had him right then and there. The sun swept hair, the tired-but-in-a-cute-way look of his eyes, the nervous grin, the frog—god it was like someone personally sculpted him to her exact spefifications.

"We got him going though, in the end," he finished. "He said he had to be at work for 6."

"Wait what time is it?"

"About 6:10 now. I hope he made it."

"We slept for less than five hours."

"Oh," Peter said. "Yeah I guess we did."

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"That we still have time to go to school?"

Michelle dropped the hand shielding her face to glare directly at Peter. She wasn't sure what to say, but she knew she had to communicate how she felt somehow. That communication took the form of an intense stare that bore into Peter and crushed his lungs with an iron gauntlet. He coughed a bit and failed to make eye contact with his captain.

"I," Michelle began thoughtfully, "had a different idea in mind." She gestured to the opening of the cozy looking tent. "Like more sleep?"

While it looked like Peter was thinking about it, as soon as Michelle had even _implied_ going back into that tent with her, Peter was fucking game. But! He was still tired, kinda high, and very injured from the previous night's escapades. He stood there silently like a malfunctioning machine that you don't quite know what's wrong with it but maybe it's something in the CPU? I don't know, they're the geniuses, I barely passed math, shut up.

Regardless, Michelle took all of this silence and inaction as indecisiveness. Peter wasn't exactly the greatest decision maker, so when presented with make or break opportunities like this one, everyone expected him to stutter a bit.

"Apparently you need some more convincing," Michelle scoffed. "How's this." And then finally when Peter had found the exact words to express his utmost desire to join MJ back in her tent, her lips were on his and he was falling back against the stone railing and she was pushing into him and her mouth was wet against his and she was pulling his hair and soon he was grabbing her hair and her waist and her cheeks as he pulled her against his body and she reciprocated as they explored each other eagerly, earnestly, and without regard for what the other could possibly be thinking in this very moment until finally Michelle needed to breathe.

She almost fell backwards from the dizziness when she resurfaced. She was only at an arm's length from Peter but already she could feel the warmth dissipating between them. He look flustered and messy and he blushed carmine when he caught her stare—it matched his suit.

"What was—"

"Are you sure you're completely over Liz? It's only been a few weeks since you last saw her and now..."

Peter waited to see if she would continue, but when it was clear that she was giving him the floor he said, "Yeah and now I'm seeing someone else."

Michelle squinted at that one. "What is that supposed to mean, Parker?"

The blush returned. "Well I didn't _mean_ anything you know I just thought because you and me, you know we, you know I just thought because of that maybe you and I were.."

"You thought that you and I were a thing? An item?"

"Well when you put it like that—"

"Good," Michelle said confidently, "I wouldn't have it any other way." And then she was back on him and this time she no longer cared for air.

§

When they finally had their fill, they settled back into the cozy confines of the tent. Whatever Peter was to her, Michelle didn't care and only concerned herself with holding as close as she could. For his part Peter wrapped his good arm around her shoulders while she nestled her head under his chin (which, given the height difference, some might argue should be the other way around). In his other hand was his phone which he used to text Ned.

Michelle could read the message from her vantage point. "You're actually going to school?"

Peter continued texting while he spoke. "Ned and I have a project to present. I can't leave him hanging, he'd never forgive me!"

His compatriot rolled her eyes. Sometimes she wondered if his loyalty had a line. Sometimes she was glad it didn't.

"Well," Michelle began, tightening her grip around the Spider-Boy to emphasize her next point: "I still have you for the next two hours, and I intend to use them effectively. _Very_ effectively."

A small drop of sweat rolled down Peter's forehead. The tent entrance was still open and the tent was still somewhat cold. Regardless, Peter's palms were clammier than he'd like to admit.

"W-What did you have in mind?"

Michelle pulled back to grin at him coyly. Peter swallowed a lump in his throat.

"To sleep!" She lodged herself into the same position she was in before, clean and Christian. "Bitch!" She added.

The Bitch™ in question breathed a sigh of relief. He kissed his handler's head and returned to texting. Michelle found herself lulled to sleep by the quiet tapping of skin on glass. Every so often Peter would mutter something under his breath, whether it be repeating something he was about to send or repeating something Ned had just sent; the latter often followed with a shallow chuckle. Neither of the teens thought to question why their friend was awake at such an ungodly hour.

Peter used the next two hours to text Ned. In between their short conversations, Peter flexed his arm and found it to be in increasingly good health. His inhuman healing abilities supplemented with MJ's expert medical skills made for a faint scar where a gunshot wound had been mere hours before. The Amazing Spider-Man was sure to make Ned aware of this, and The Guy in The Chair was quick to the Q&A.

 _ned: do you think youd survive a gunshot to the head? [7:46]_

 _peter: I dont want to find out [7:47]_

 _ned: what if we cut off one of your legs? would it grow back [7:47]_

 _ned: like a lizard [7:48]_

 _peter: see my previous answer [7:49]_

 _ned: think of the potential! [7:49]_

 _peter: isnt human experimentation a war crime? [7:50]_

 _ned: I was actually more worried about what mj would say [7:51]_

Peter glanced down at the girl sleeping on him.

 _peter:_ _see my previous answer [7:51]_

 _ned: we should probably start getting ready for school. you especially [7:52]_

 _peter: good call. see you_ _on the bus [7:52]_

 _ned: go get em spider man! [7:53]_

Peter shut off his phone with one last smile. His best friend never failed to put him in the best mood possible.

But Peter's fraternal fuzziness was cut short when he realized his next dilemma. You know when a cat falls asleep on your lap and you can't bring yourself to move because it's such a rare occurrence that you want to last as long as possible no matter what important thing you have to do in that moment? Well that's the dilemma that Peter faced in _that_ moment. The cutest girl he'd ever seen in his life sleeping against him was something he wanted to last _forever_. But his education was so important! Not to mention May would kill him if she found out he missed another day of school. And Ned!

Peter's indecision was matched only by the anxiety created from it. As everyone in his class would highlight over and over, he wasn't the best decision maker under great stress (like a time limit). That's why he always wanted to join the Avengers, so he could follow under the guidance of great heroes and still be a great hero in his own right.

The 16-year-old wondered if that's what brought him into conflict with Captain America. Steve Rogers wasn't someone who followed, no more than Mr Stark was. Could the world handle more than one hero leading the charge? Would there ever be a threat big enough to merit such a situation?

Michelle stirred and Peter was quickly drawn from his daze. The older girl had only moved a little and still she snored softly.

The number _8:00_ flashed on Peter's phone. The bus would be at his stop in forty minutes.

"MJ," Peter whispered. "MJ," he whispered again a little louder. He shook her a bit with his arm around her shoulders. "MJ," he said, no longer whispering. "Come on MJ, please wake up." He shook her some more.

While he was shaking her he heard her whisper something very softly.

"What?"

She spoke up. "You have to kiss her to break the curse."

"What?"

"You have to kiss her to break the curse," she repeated, coming off a bit more agitated than your regular princess. "Like Sleeping Beauty."

"Oh I never saw that movie."

Michelle shot up so fast that she almost struck Peter's chin with her head. "You've seen all the Indiana Jones movies, all the Star Wars movies, and all the Star _Trek_ movies but you haven't seen the timeless animated Disney classic Sleeping Beauty?!"

Peter responded meekly, "It's not really my thing."

Michelle could only hold her forehead with her open palm to stop herself from smacking this fool.

"You're staying home and we're watching all the animated Disney movies," she said very matter-of-factually.

"No wait," Peter protested, "I really have to go to school. I already told Ned I'd be there and if he has to present our project alone—"

"Yeah yeah he'd never forgive you, I got it," Michelle said. "Fine, go to school. But just remember who offered you a fun day of sleeping, Disney movies, and all this..." she gestured to her whole-ass self. Peter allowed himself a few seconds to absorb what that entailed.

"Come on," she said, already on her feet. "I'll walk you to my stop. You can say you were picking up a book before school."

"Thanks, you're the best." He stood up and hugged her tightly.

"I know. But that outfit is still a problem."

"Oh, actually Ned's got me covered. He's bringing me the spare clothes I leave at his place."

Michelle beamed at her incredibly (and surprisingly) prepared boyf—thing.

"Come on. We're short on time and you still need a shower."

§

Michelle was the only student at her bus stop. The corner of 51st and 3rd was the farthest the bus had to go into Queens which meant Michelle had plenty of time before it reached her stop.

The two star-crossed lovers stood silently on their corner. It was still cold under the dark glare of the tall buildings, but Michelle managed to find warm in Peter's hand which clasped hers for dear life. The sleeves of his jacket were rolled up and she could see the hairs on his arms standing at attention. She thought of asking him about it but decided she didn't want to bother him right before school. There was plenty of time after school for them to "talk" about it.

At least, she hoped.

The bright yellow bus came to a screeching halt before Peter and MJ's eyes. The doors swung open and Peter kissed his girlf—thing, goodbye. With a final wave out the window, the bus was gone and down the street. Michelle watched it go with a blissfully ignorant smile.

Turning to walk back to her apartment, MJ popped earphones in. She scrolled through her Spotify library until she found a song she liked.

 _Dust In The Wind_ played quietly in her ear while she walked away. The sunlight was finally breaching the Queens skyline, but it never reached her cold figure. Something was hovering above New York, just over New York Harbor. Michelle, music still censoring the world around her, continued on her way.

She sang a little to herself.


End file.
